


wisteria

by kafkas



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Character Study, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-05
Updated: 2018-02-05
Packaged: 2019-03-14 00:18:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13582017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kafkas/pseuds/kafkas
Summary: ‘Let me make you something. A statement piece.’





	wisteria

 

The flat’s a modest three-bedroom affair in the Shitamachi area, secluded and a little rickety. Shuu could have chosen somewhere more metropolitan but, ultimately, the rent had been cheaper in the 6th Ward. That and – well. The Fueguchi girl had liked the courtyard garden.

It had taken Kaneki some time to warm to the idea. ‘We shouldn’t be remaining sedentary like this,’ he’d said, upon surveying the property, ‘The CCG knows Hinami’s profile, and mine – it’ll only be a matter of time before we’re smoked out.’

‘Before hazarding a leap, one must first step back, _mon ami_ ,’ Shuu had countered, smiling his most reasonable smile, ‘View this as an opportunity to –’

‘Rest?’ That same flat, grim look he’d worn upon emerging from Yamori’s torture chamber. ‘Is that what you were going to say?’

‘I was thinking something more along the lines of… convalescence.’

‘Huh.’ Kaneki stared at him for a long moment, a little disgusted, perhaps even dimly amused, before turning his gaze to the scuffed wooden floorboards. ‘Hinami likes it,’ he murmured, softly, ‘She’s a growing girl. All this sneaking around’s been tough on her.’

It was drizzling outside, just barely, and the air was muggy despite the freshly fallen snow. The effect it produced was dreamlike and hazy. In the grey morning light, Kaneki looked terribly tired; there was a hard set to the lines of his face that hadn’t been present there before – Shuu couldn’t decide whether or not he appreciated the added character.

‘I believe the ground floor was once used as a tea shop,’ he’d supplied, hoping, at the very least, to lighten the mood.

Kaneki had snorted – a small, unhappy sound. ‘Very appropriate of you.’

‘ _C’est très nostalgique, non?_ ’ And again, that look. _Nostalgic of what, exactly?_ Shuu felt something inside of him shrivel and quail. ‘I’ll be headed off then, shall I?’

Unbridled resentment turned quickly to cool, reserved politesse. Kaneki smiled an impersonal smile that pricked at Shuu like a needle. ‘We’ll call you – if anything comes up.’

Curt bow; his hair in his eyes, masking his expression. ‘ _Bien sûr_.’

 

 

 

When Shuu was five-years-old, his mother died. Her death was a slow and arduous one; no longer capable of taking food, regenerative abilities severely depleted, her body had consumed itself like a candlewick burning at both ends. Shuu remembers peeking out from behind Matsmuae – she would have been about twelve at the time, the daughter of their head maidservant – and being unable to comprehend what it was he saw. Tsukiyama Kaori had deteriorated beyond all recognition; as an adult, Shuu would liken her image to that of prisoners of war, or cancer patients, but having no point of reference in that moment, all the boy had felt was a mild confusion.

Tsukiyama Mirumo was knelt on the floor beside his wife. There were tears leaking out from behind his spectacles.

‘Matsu-chan, why is Papa crying?’ Shuu had asked, laughingly, the way a child will when they are frightened. Shuu’s grandfather had slapped him for it, later, after Mirumo had left the room.

‘Stupid boy, have you no shame?’

The fustian carpet was coarse against Shuu’s cheek. He’d fallen under the weight of the blow, and had remained laying there well into the night, listening to the hum of the humidifiers, the gentle beep of his mother’s respirator. The room had smelt of boiling marrow, and of the musky pink flowers on the beside table. Wisterias, if he remembers correctly.

The next day, his mother was gone.

 

 

 

Somebody is speaking. Madame A, he thinks – voice shrill, wig askew. Muffled sobs, puerile begging, and then, a wet crunch. The earthen scent of fresh blood blooms in the back of Shuu’s throat, his nostrils. Papaver, hibiscus, lycorus. A brilliant red.

‘That’s quite enough, Kaneki-kun.’

These people were not his friends, but there reaches a point where the violence becomes – distasteful. Kaneki drops the ghoul’s severed arm. It flops about wetly on the asphalt like a dying fish, still struggling. A sour note taints the air as Madame A doubles over, retching.

Shuu turns with a sympathetic smile. ‘Do try to contain yourself, _ma chéri_. After all, you’re as well versed in violence as any one of us here.’

‘Backstabbing bastard –’

Shuu brandishes his kagune warningly. ‘I would choose your next words wisely if I were you, Miss Maiko.’

Madame A’s mouth snaps shut. As Banjou muscles her into his kei car, she manages to shoot him a foreboding glare – quite an achievement, really, considering the state of her face. She’d held out against Kaneki’s ministrations longer than Shuu had expected. _Mais enfin_ – he’s never done in a scraggly old carpetbagger like her before. Perhaps she’s been through worse ordeals.

‘The one-eyed girl.’ Kaneki, his kagune rescinded now, looking glum.

‘A problem for another day,’ Shuu tuts, fishing for his car keys.

The family Elmiraj – a gleaming, black hulk of a thing. Papa had warned him about soiling the upholstery again but alas the situation appears to be unavoidable. Shuu props open the passenger-side door; as Kaneki ducks beneath his arm, he catches a heady whiff of his scent and has to grit his teeth against the rush of hunger that washes over him. _A gentleman_ , Shuu reminds himself, _is simply a patient wolf._

 

 

‘You enjoyed that.’ Kaneki’s voice is low, disapproving. ‘You love it – their fear. The power it lends you.’

Shuu doesn’t appreciate his tone. ‘What need have I for power? Plenty of that already, _caro_.’

‘False power. Sycophantic love.’ Kaneki casts him a sidelong glance. ‘All that idolatry. It’s made you complacent.’ In the evening _chiaroscuro_ , his profile has the look of an austere cameo ornament. Shuu wants to sink his teeth into that supple white flesh. He wants to prostrate himself at Kaneki’s feet.

‘Complacency, hm? That may be so.’ He shrugs, easily. ‘It’s not so bad. You should try it sometime.’

Kaneki smiles. He’s in one of his gentle, reflexive moods. ‘You enjoy it.’

‘I most certainly do.’

‘You must have relished the way I looked at you, then. Back at Kamii, and at the bookshop.’ Kaneki sinks back into his seat, sounding almost wistful. ‘I idolized you,’ he murmurs, very softly, ‘I truly did.’

‘And now?’

Another rueful twist of the lips. ‘Now, you worry me.’

Shuu feels something stutter between his ribs. ‘Then I shall endeavor to ease your mind.’

‘Oh, I’m sure you will.’ Kaneki closes his eyes, tilting his head back. ‘Lull me into complacency.’ A hollow click and the courtyard mosquito bulb flickers on automatically. Bathed in blue, Shuu can just made out the tiny white hairs running along Kaneki’s adam’s apple, the pulse thrumming in the cradle of his throat. He wonders, perversely – perversely for him, at least; here there are no visions of teeth, of carnage – what he might taste like there.

 

 

 

His childhood was a uniquely isolated one. Papa away on business more often than not; his mother gone, _ojisan_ dead a year later. There were the occasional friends, of course; students at the calligraphy workshop, the riding schools, the etiquette classes – children of other, distinguished ghouls. There was Clothilde Lesauvage, his second cousin, whom Shuu had kissed beneath the rotunda when they were twelve, and had been arranged to marry until the CCG had wiped out nearly the entire Monte Carlo branch. Her brother Benoît, whom he had fumbled awkwardly with in a pantry during a memorial service some years later, and who he had written rambling, overwrought letters to for several months before he, too, fell mysteriously silent.

_Tokyo is so cold in the wintertime._

_I miss Monte Carlo. I miss Le Château de Lesauvage. Do you still attend the Circuit?_

_Je suis une chose creuse._

When Matsumae had chanced upon the bundle of postcards, she had advised Shuu gently, with creases about her eyes, to burn them. ‘Master Mirumo would not like it,’ she’d enthused, and Shuu had done as he was told. Papa was not a cruel man, but family was not, in his opinion, built upon the individual’s desires. Shuu would make a good marriage, just like he and Kaori had. He would sire heirs and eventually take over the Tsukiyama Group. That was what was best for the family: structure, business, and tradition, not some – childish infatuation.

Matsumae, then, bore the brunt of Shuu’s upbringing, whilst Papa was otherwise concerned with issues of structure, business, and tradition. Quiet, dependable Matsumae, who was like an older sister, in that she was aloof for the most part but, he sensed, secretly quite fond of him. Yet she was also a servant. It was sometimes difficult to reconcile the two.

Contrastingly, Kanae was likewise indentured, but tied to Shuu by blood, a fact that had, at first, thrilled him to bits. Thrilled him, that was, until he grew up a little and Kanae’s particular brand of affection became clearer to him, and thus, there existed always a thin veneer of discomfort between them. One did not look at a foster brother as Kanae looked at Shuu. A servant certainly wouldn’t dare.

In this manner, Shuu had familiarized himself with the small triumphs and staggering misfortunes blood-families were expected to deal with intrinsically – always at a distance, always unsure of whether or not he was overstepping his bounds. When Matsumae’s mother had not come back from hunting one night, he had grasped her shoulder, but had not embraced her as he wished to. Kanae’s violent mood swings, his days spent tramping about the garden with proverbial rainclouds over his head, could not be dissipated by Shuu simply saying what he felt inclined to, which was: _ich liebe dich, du kleiner Dummkopf. Come back inside and we’ll play the piano together like old times._

He did not, even, visit his mother’s memorial statue – a swan carved from white marble, forever caught midflight – unless his Papa expressly demanded he do so. He did not feel it was his right, though he knew just what flowers he would place there: silky pink wisterias, buoyed up by white columbines, chervil, and iris for mourning.

Thoughts like these perturbed him often.

 

 

 

‘You’re not called for today.’

‘Ah, Monsieur Banjoi, you’re as welcoming as ever, I see.’ Shuu would tear the man apart if he thought he’d taste any good. Acrid and gamey, like the 11th ward detritus he’d been reared on. And don’t think he doesn’t catch the three little myrmidons giving him the stink eye as he passes by the sitting room.

‘It would be unwise,’ he murmurs, setting down his load, ‘to look a gift horse in the mouth.’

Gerber daisies, English ivy; wax begonias for the bathroom; sweet osmanthus to cheer the little lady; peace lilies, piped and elegant. There are few things Shuu loves so much as brightly colored flowers wrapped in newspaper.

‘Are you trying to stink out the whole house?’ Banjou exclaims, gagging.

Patient smile, reticent. He does not wish to show his teeth. ‘I was not aware your sense of smell was so well refined, Monsieur Banjoi.’

Banjou’s expression turns grim. Shuu will pay for this, he thinks, during their next training session. ‘It isn’t. Anyone could smell that.’

Shuu shrugs. ‘Perhaps some of the more fragrant arrangements I’ll take for myself, then.’

‘Oh, no, don’t do that!’ Hinami cries, bounding down the stairs. Shuu watches as she gathers the bundles in her arms, smiling in a way that is both happy and sad. A child who knows to take her blessings where they’re given. She is wearing the blouse Shuu had bought her for Christmas, white cotton with pastoral scenes stitched about the collar; wheat wreathes and dancing girls. A pleated skirt, too, after he’d seen her admiring the local girls’ school uniforms.

Kaneki had looked supremely uncomfortable upon receiving his own gift – Kafka, _Letters to Felice_ , bound in leather.

‘I – forgot.’

‘ _Dimenticalo, caro_. You’ve more pressing things to attend to.’

‘No, I mean – Kafka.’ He’d pressed a balled fist to one eye, as if it hurt him to remember. ‘I forgot how much I loved Kafka. How could I forget?’

And Shuu hadn’t known what to say to that.

 

 

 

He’d been the one to speak to Gil. Either the others have great faith in his people skills, or they’d deemed him expendable enough to suffer the risk. Shuu suspects it’s the latter.

He’d forgotten how disagreeable 6th Ward ghouls could be.

Later, a cut healing across his cheek, the bridge of his nose, Kaneki had commended him for his efforts. ‘It was me he wanted. I suspect sending you may have wounded his ego.’

‘Quite the snub, _non?_ ’

Kaneki ignored him, focusing instead on the coffee he had been brewing when Shuu first staggered through the door. ‘He’s frightened, but he’s not malicious. We ought to speak to him.’

Shuu grinned a sickly grin, teeth lacquered pink with blood. ‘I’m nothing if not forgiving, _mon cœur_.’

Kaneki had turned then, and it was the sheer indifference of his expression that wounded Shuu, rather than the words that followed. ‘It is not for the guilty party to absolve or to blame. Remind me just what _I’ve_ done to offend _you?_ ’

‘Well, you and your cronies from Anteiku did dismember me, _par exemple._ ’

‘Did we?’ He scarcely remembered. ‘Well, you hurt my friend.’

Shuu wasn’t sure which friend he’d been referring to – the Kirishima woman or Nishiki Nishio. Perhaps somebody else entirely. And really, that in itself spoke volumes.

Now, he seeks to exonerate himself. Kaneki’s icy glares are _très alléchant_ , to be sure, but one quickly grows tired of frigidity. It hardly makes for an appetizing meal. Better a betrayal of trust, reinstated. Or, better yet, no need for betrayal at all.

To say that the thought of Kaneki potentially _offering_ him a bite makes Shuu’s mouth water would only be to minimize the feeling.

‘Let me make you something. A statement piece.’

They’re carrying wax paper packages from Shuu’s Elmiraj to the courtyard icebox. Dorsi, pectoralis, quadriceps the size of fattened piglets. A tupperware container of tongues selected especially for Hinami, her favorite.

‘I already have a mask,’ Kaneki says, bluntly.

‘That hideous leather contraption?’ Shuu sniffs. ‘I’m surprised you can breathe, let alone eat in the thing.’

‘Uta didn’t make yours?’

‘The Tsukiyama household has its own tailors.’

‘Why am I not surprised?’

‘Anyway, that’s besides the point, as I’m not talking about a mask.’

They pause a moment by the freezer while Jiro and Ichimi pack everything in. Through the tinted front windscreen, Shuu can spy Kanae watching them disapprovingly from his slump in the driver’s seat. Kaneki notes this too, sighing in irritation. He’s never had much of a stomach for the trappings Shuu’s position affords him – chauffeurs and maidservants and suspicious looking caterers in black mourning veils.

‘Look, you’ve already done so much for us,’ he says, truly meaning: _please, god, leave me be_ , ‘The house alone must have set you back a fortune, I can’t just –’

‘ _Senza senso_ , it was nothing! And this thing I ask of you, Kaneki – this small thing – it would be my pleasure, _s’il vous plaît_.’

Kanae blares the horn, sticks his head out the window. ‘Master Shuu, the benefit ball! You’re going to be late!’ Poor pet. He really is terribly transparent.

‘You should go,’ Kaneki says, weakly.

‘Let me do it.’

A beat. Jiro is tapping her foot, Ichimi flushed beet red from something like second-hand embarrassment.

‘Fine,’ Kaneki ascends, defeated, ‘Fine, but nothing too flashy.’

‘ _Naturellement, mon ami_.’

 

 

 

He remembers Kanae’s fourteenth birthday well. The little boy chalk-white with fear, a gaping hole the size of a fist cleaved through his stomach after his first proper hunt. Matsumae trying desperately to get some food into him. Shuu stood wayside, feeling guilty. Feeling strangely jealous, too. Matsumae had an informal way of chiding his cousin – there was no kowtowing, no honorifics. Shuu could never imagine somebody speaking to him in such a manner. With such love and such fury.

‘Silly thing, what were you thinking? If you died, who would take care of the hothouse, hm?’

Kanae had summoned up a wobbly smile before coughing a wad of blood into his hands, keening quietly.

‘ _Ich liebe dich_ ,’ he’d slurred, much later, as Shuu and Matsumae had helped him up the stairs, ‘ _Ich liebe dich. Ich verehre dich. Du bist mein Ein und Alles._ ’ Ostensibly to the both of them. Intended, however, for Shuu alone. He could tell from the look in his eye – wild and reaching. A loyal hound dog.

 _Why me?_ Shuu had wanted to ask, _What have I done?_ Really, the one he should be enamored with was Matsumae.

Instead, he’d simply sighed long-sufferingly and patted his cousin on the back. ‘ _Ich liebe dich auch, Kanae_. _Ich liebe dich auch._ ’

It was not, he thought, what the boy wanted to hear.

 

 

 

A quick fitting. The myrmidons asleep, Banjou and Hinami attending some late night movie screening. Kaneki is perched on the kitchen island, sink to his left, chopping board to his right. Shuu wants to splay his fingers over it, knife them off one by one. He imagines the splintered bone, sharp enough to cut. Wonders how his own blood might taste, mingled with a half-ghoul’s.

‘There was a famous daimyō who wore an eye patch,’ he says, distracting himself, ‘Date Masamune.’

‘ _Rectitude carried to excess hardens into stiffness; benevolence indulged beyond measure sinks into weakness_.’

‘The One-Eyed Dragon,’ Shuu hums, pressing the mold to Kaneki’s eye.

Kaneki, uncomfortable with the proximity, shifts backward. ‘Where’d you learn to sew, anyway?’

‘Our maidservants, and before then, my mother,’ Shuu answers, placidly, ‘Thread this for me, would you?’

Kaneki accepts the needle warily, as if expecting a trap. He wets the thread with the tip of his tongue, pink, catlike. Shuu is suddenly consumed with the urge to bite it out.

‘ _Grazie._ ’

‘You know, it’s funny, but I always imagined you having sisters.’

Shuu cocks his head. ‘How so?’

Kaneki shrugs. ‘The way you talk to women. How good you are with Hinami. It just seemed to fit.’

‘Is this about my boutonnière?’

Kaneki chuckles. It’s a sound he’s quick to tamp down on. ‘You’re too sensitive.’

‘Well, I’ve certainly never been accused of that before.’ Shuu leans back, admiring his work. ‘How’s it feel?’

Kaneki crinkles his nose. ‘Still too tight.’

‘Apologies – _un moment s’il vous plaît._ ’ Shuu removes the patch, reaching for his seam ripper. Kaneki could vacate the kitchen, but he remains sitting, picking absently at a hangnail.

‘Was it lonely?’ he asks, plainly.

‘I had Kanae.’

‘That boy who drives you here? He’s an employee, not a friend.’

‘He’s been very good to me,’ Shuu protests. _Ich liebe dich, ich verehre dich_ –

‘That’s all people have ever been to you, all your life. Good.’ Kaneki glances up at him, and it’s with that cold, calculating look that in turn cows and excites him. In the pale corona of light thrown out by the kitchen overhead, his eyes have a flat, marbled look to them, reptilian. ‘I wonder what that makes me, then?’

Shuu swallows dryly. ‘Special. Very special,’ and then, softer, ‘ _Je suis fou de toi_.’

‘You know I don’t speak French.’

‘I know.’ Shuu, finished with the eye-patch, snips away an inch of extra thread, smiling wryly. ‘It’s my secret pleasure. Try this?’ Kaneki pulls the elastic over his head. This time, the mold fits more agreeably. ‘Better?’

‘Much better, thank you.’

He tilts his head from side to side. Shuu watches him nervously.

‘And the design? It’s not too garish?’

‘Apparently I’ll look more proportionate if I wear something that draws attention to my upper body.’

‘You remembered,’ Shuu exclaims, delighted.

‘You made that day hard to forget.’

And just like that, his mood is dampened. ‘Yes… Yes, I suppose I did.’

Kaneki shakes his head, slipping to the ground. ‘The eye-patch is nice. I’ll be sure to wear it when we visit Gil.’

‘Kaneki-kun –’ Shuu, in a suddenly panic, reaches out, bracketing him against the bench. If Kaneki interprets the gesture as predatory – and it is, _it is_ , it surely must be – he does not show it. His expression is perfectly calm.

‘Why are you here, Tsukiyama?’

Shuu swallows. ‘Because you’re…’

‘The white whale?’ Kaneki smiles meanly. ‘The One-Eyed Dragon? Which is it? You can’t have both.’

For the first time in his life, he is at a loss for words. Kaneki’s smile fades into something perhaps resembling pity.

‘Oh, Shuu. No one’s ever done anything but adore you, have they?’

Yes. Yes and no. People have always loved him. People have always hurt him, too. _Maybe,_ whispers a tiny, malicious voice, _you’ve been hurt so much you don’t know the difference anymore._

_Maybe no one’s ever gotten close enough to hurt you._

_Maybe you’ve been hurting all your life._

Kaneki still does not move. Standing this close together, Shuu can feel the charge in the air that follows him everywhere he goes now; a hot, prickling sensation, like frostbite. He watches, stupefied, as Kaneki brings his thumb up to the corner of his mouth. His teeth are not sharp – he is not so wholly a monster – but one’s skin is easy enough to puncture with the right amount of willpower. Blood wells to the surface, dark as oil slick in the half-light. Shuu feels his nostrils flare, the hunger sinking like a heavy stone inside of him.

‘Bite me, and I’ll rip your throat out.’ There is more blood smeared across Kaneki’s mouth, his chin. Shuu doesn’t understand. His eyelids are spasming, sclera pulsing black. And to think – he used to have so much self-control.

‘ _Benevolence indulged beyond measure_ ,’ Kaneki mutters, self-deprecating.

‘ _P-pardon moi?_ ’

Lips over his. A hand on his shoulder. Warm air, puffing against his cheek. Shuu feels his jaw lock up, saliva flooding the space behind his gums. He wants so badly to gnash – wants to eat – has never felt so starved in his life. _Je suis une chose creuse._

Kaneki tugs at his chin a little, trying to gain access. Shuu, shuddering, grits his teeth. More than his hunger, he is afraid. Not of Kaneki; he knows his threats are empty – he would not be doing this if they weren’t. Afraid of something else, then. Suddenly he is a little boy; Matsumae has just presented him with a difficult equation and Shuu is stumped, angry, tearful. He was never a temperate child.

‘Well.’ It’s only when he speaks that Shuu realizes Kaneki has drawn away. His gaze is clear, bright, if not a little befuddled. Shuu can only imagine how he himself must look – glassy-eyed, panting, appallingly aroused. ‘That was –’ rapid-fire blinking, a crease of the brows, ‘You really could have done it, you know.’

Unable to meet his eye, Shuu stares at the ground. The off-white linoleum floor. His loafers – Harpelunde, velvet. There is a rustle as Kaneki removes the eye patch. A moment later, it is pressed into Shuu’s hand.

A different sinking feeling hits Shuu’s stomach. ‘You hate it.’

Kaneki laughs – a short, harsh bark of a thing. ‘No, no. It’s perfect. I want you to make me three more.’

His smile seems genuine enough. Something inside of Shuu trembles and then unfurls languorously, like a tea flower.

‘And perhaps, after that – a suit?’

‘Don’t push your luck.’

 

 

 

‘Tsukiyama-san,’ Hinami, her nose pressed to the window. Shuu looks up from the hamstring he’s been dicing.

‘ _Oui, mon oisillon?_ ’

Hinami blinks at him hesitantly, her bottom lip caught between her teeth. Banjou’s constant reproach for him must be weighing on her conscience. ‘That creeper,’ she says, eventually, gesturing to the courtyard garden, ‘Will it ever bloom?’

Shuu leans across the kitchen island, peering out the window. The plant in question is a straggly wood-climber, running almost the entire length of the outer wall and disappearing over the back fence. An ugly thing, like something out of a gothic fairytale.

‘Mm, yes, I imagine so,’ Shuu posits, returning to his meal.

‘Is it a hydrangea?’ Hinami wonders aloud, brightening a little at the prospect of a flowering spring.

Shuu hesitates a moment, knife hovering over the chopping board. ‘Wisteria, actually.’

‘Oh. Is that good?’

Shuu smiles faintly. ‘ _Wisteria in bloom – voices of pilgrims, voices of birds_. Longevity.’

‘L— long –?’

‘Devotion.’

‘Oh.’ Hinami flushes. ‘That’s romantic.’

‘Quite.’ Shuu sighs quietly through his nose. ‘I wonder if we’ll have white blossoms this year, or blue? Silky pink would lighten up the house…’

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> [♫](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dIW8TwsQ-k)


End file.
